What happened to the orange cone? Vertical Lines in deep reds and oranges.

[Sullah]

This only happens with Procoder 3, no other encoder that was tested yielded the same result.

Does anyone know what this is and how to fix it?

I thought it was chroma subsempling http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chroma_subsampling but apparently it s not.

I have attached two snapshots. The problem in this frames is visible on the ORANGE CONE.

The source is miniDV shot on the DVX100, exported from Avid using Avid DV codec (DV25)

Encoding in Cinema Craft SP3, Sorenson 6 and DVD Flick did not cause this issue but the overall outcome is much better in Procoder aside from this issue so I would love to solve it and keep using Procoder.

Thank you for looking into this.

[jagabo]

4:1:1 YUV is being upsampled to 4:4:4 RGB incorrectly. In a DV frame the Y (luma) channel is stored at the full frame width but the U and V (chroma) channels are stored at 1/4 the width of the frame.

Y plane:


U and V planes:


The U and V planes are being stretched to the full frame width incorrectly. Probably with a point resize rather than a smooth resize.

V plane upscaled with a point resize:


V plane upscaled with a bicubic resize:



Use a different DV decoder if possible.

[Sullah]

Thank you. You do know a lot about these things

Is there any way to fix that in Procoder 3? Settings, filters, codec change? Anything? Any tweaking at all?

Using another encoder does not give me the same overall results.

[jagabo]

I added more details to my last post. I don't know if Procoder has its own built in DV decoder or if it is using a system installed (VFW or DirectShow) DV decoder. If it's using an installed DV decoder you can just use a different DV decoder (for example, ffdshow has the problem described, Cedocida doesn't).

From a little searching, it looks like Procoder uses the system installed DV decoder. Just disable, or deprecate, that decoder and install another. You can use a filter editor to change decoder preferences.

[Sullah]

jagabo, this is amazing. Thank you so much for explaining this to me.

I will have to figure out a way to go about this but at least now I know there is a solution. I have never used filters in Procoder but I am sure I can figure it out.

Is Cedocida the best DV decoder out there based on your experience?

[Sullah]

I cannot figure out how to change the DV decoder in Procoder 3, apparenlty it uses the Canopus DV Codec which is causing the error demonstrated above.

Does anyone have any idea how to change that?

[loster]

Have you consider frameseving or decompressing the DV to a lossless AVI using an external program?

[Sullah]

I don't think I really understand what that means.

You mean turning the 28GB DV output file from avid into an AVI? Meaning uncompressing the DV output and then re-compressing it using Procoder?

DV is a compressed medium so I am not sure I understand.

The problem I am experiencing only happens when the Avid DV codec is not in use which I think Procoder does not use. Are you suggesting I uncompress as a work around and re-compress using another codec? I think that by doing so the problem would return unless I use the Avid DV codec.

[jagabo]

Frame serving is the passing of video from one program to another without saving to an intermediate file. You could use VirtualDub or AviSynth to decode the DV and convert to RGB -- then frame serve to Procoder. Assuming Procoder accepts frame served video.

If that doesn't work you could convert to losslessly compressed (HuffYUV or Lagarith) AVI and use that in Procoder.

[Sullah]

I see. It feels like it would be doing something beyond my capabilities so I'll have to consider all the options.

Still no luck with Procoder and Sorenson is just refusing to do what I want. I hope Procoder's DV decoder can be changed in any way, I posted on the Grass Valley forum but no one replied to me yet.

[Sullah]

My DV is RGB, why would I have to convert it to RGB?

I exported from avid using RGB and DV codec.

[jagabo]

DV is YUV 4:1:1 internally. DV decoders can output YUV or RGB.

Frame serving with VirtualDub is very easy. Just open the DV AVI file in VirtualDub, select File -> Start Frame Serve, enter a file name for the frame server (just a small file for passing information to the servee). Then in the other editor open that file.

You must run AuxSetup.exe (in the VirtualDub folder) once on your system to enable VirutualDub's frame serving.

[Sullah]

Thank you for the explanation.

My solution was to do as you suggested in your first reply and switch encoder, the issue is not present with Sorenson Sqeeze 6.

In the future I will try and learn the frame serving process you have described. Thank you.